Minnesota Governor Offers To End Shutdown, Reestablish Beer Supply

It seems the threat of becoming boozeless in Minnesota was enough to finally motivate Governor Mark Dayton to try to end the shutdown out of fear he'd need to impose order on a state full of stone sober Lutherans, who if any of you history majors out there can remember are just descendants of the Viking "barbarians" that even Marcus Bachmann cannot cure, so it will all eventually end up in a Canadian invasion to kidnap Minnesota's hockey players and Prince. Anyway, Dayton has agreed to the fiscal measures proposed by the Republican-controlled legislature, which means Minnesota will have a balanced budget now, freedom wins hooray?

No, the Awesome GOP Plan is to not pay K-12 schools for another year (children get 165 snow days next year, best day evar!) and to borrow against future tax income. We're sure that's not how we got here to begin with?

Republicans have not yet agreed to this, because they are grumbling that Dayton won't let them keep their "kill the pregnant ladies and homos" and the "fire all the state workers" sections of the spending bills.

The Star Tribune reports:  

"This is the only viable option that's potentially available," Dayton said, while speaking at the University of Minnesota's Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs. Making clear that he is unhappy with the terms, Dayton said, "I am just disappointed we can't do it better."

It remains far from clear whether Dayton's latest offer would end the nation's longest government shutdown, now heading into its third week.

Senate GOP spokesman Michael Brodkorb said after Dayton's announcement that Senate Republican leaders were still studying the offer and were not ready to comment.

Republican legislators said Dayton's new conditions might not be acceptable and several expressed unease with the budget solution their own leaders had offered. That proposal, made to Dayton on June 30, would increase spending by $1.4 billion solely through withholding money from K-12 schools and borrowing against future tobacco revenue.

Nah, "kids don't need school" and "cancer tax money" both sound pretty good, we'd say go ahead and go with that. [ StarTribune ]